In Time
by RubyFiamma
Summary: [8059] [Drablet] How everything can change in an instant, it's all in a matter of time. [Warning : Major Character Death]


**A/N : Just a warning, in case you didn't read the summary. Heavy angst and character death ahead. **

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**In Time**

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Time stops. Before you know it, you're frozen. There's no sound that surrounds you but the silence is deafening. Your whole body is cold and rigid and in the moment, you feel like you're the one that's dying.

Except that it isn't you, it's _him_ and he falls to the hard and unwelcoming marble floor in the slowest motion, so slow that the droplets of blood that dispersed from the bullet wound seem to coagulate in mid air, playing an excruciating kind of trickery to your otherwise sharp, green eyes. These little beads of blood pause before they implode, splattering the walls and the Tenth's face, which happens to have a mouth wrought and twisted into a blood curdling scream you that doesn't reach your ears.

There's an odd feeling, like unseen tendrils of poisonous carbon monoxide gas that make their way into your lungs and attach themselves to the hemoglobin of your red blood cells, starving your body of it's much needed oxygen. There's a sickly, slimy sensation that slithers across your skin like a million sluggish leeches, greedily sucking away your vitality.

In the moment, you feel like you're the one that's dying.

And maybe you are, because when the cruel hands of time hit fast forward and reality surges with such a force that it knocks you to your knees, his body hits the floor with a brutal thud and your heart seizes. It locks mid beat and holds steady until you feel the agonizing fissures rip through the organ needed to sustain your life force.

The Tenth follows him, inelegantly tripping over his feet and nearly landing on top of his body. He grips the shoulders of his suit jacket, terrified and white knuckled, screaming his name but you can't even hear it.

In a blur of black, white and silver you see Hibari and Lawn Head bite and fight the remaining rival famiglia that have brazenly ambushed you here on your home turf. These deaths you don't care about and you almost wish your body hasn't started this process of rigor because you want to get up and tear these bastards apart, blow these fuckers into oblivion for taking away the one thing you can never get back. Him.

You're suddenly pulled to your feet and shaken, and when you look down you see the wide green eyes of Lambo, who's desperately yelling at you but you still aren't able to make sense of any of it, it's all white noise to you. You don't think you've exhaled a breath and you don't think your heart has picked up it's usual rhythm. In the moment you think you're the one that's dying.

The Tenth looks over at you with such a disheartening expression that causes you to feel the sharp acidic heat of bile crawl up your throat and you push past Lambo, staggering over to the body that's violently convulsing.

You fall to your knees again but the Tenth can't stay by your side because he has to frantically scurry to find Shamal or _anyone _that can fix this.

But you know, as your ears begin to soak in sound and you hear the wet hacking coming from his cracked and bloodied lips, that there isn't any way to fix this. You've been a hitman for way too long, longer than anyone here and you've seen this many times before. Death. This is certainly death that's working its way through his body in electric spasms.

Maybe you've begun to breathe, but you're pretty sure your heart remains dormant because it's on the verge of exploding into a bloodied mass of veins and arteries that will coat the insides of your rib cage. It only beats for this one man.

You look down into the hazel eyes that the light has already been dissipating from and you feel the hot sting of tears threatening to fall.

He smiles at you and for a second he stills, raising a bloody hand to your cheek. "Don't... don't cry, Ha-Hayato," he chokes. It's a thick, mucous and blood filled hack and some of its warmth mottles your cheeks.

His beautiful olive skin has ashend, his breath has already become shallow. There isn't much time left. Though you know that this is the mafia and not a fairytale, where nothing ends in happily ever after, you've never prepared yourself for this moment. Being with him has made you naive, has made you believe in your forever after, and you don't blame him because he's made you happier than you could have ever dreamed but you just can't find the right words to say. So you settle for the only words you do know, and as you utter them, you know he wouldn't have it any other way.

"Idiot," you choke, except yours is on a sob because you're unfortunately luckier than he is. "I'm not crying."

He smiles again and it's so weak and you wish that you could just see that annoyingly vibrant smile that always makes your heart flutter against your rib cage one last time.

There is so much chaos that surrounds the two of you but it seems that in this moment, you're the only ones in the room. When his breath becomes short and ragged, you grab his hand and bring it up to your lips, the cold feel if his skin sending a shock through them and you finally break. This is death.

"I... I'm s-sorry," he says but you can barely hear it and he's looking at you but he's also looking past you, off into some aimless direction - perhaps that bright light at the end of that proverbial tunnel; his milky gaze is unable to focus. His normally vibrant hazel eyes that you love to stare into are glazed over and lifeless.

"Don't talk," you say even though you want to hear his voice. You want to hear it forever; the way he calls out your name is so many colourful tones, especially the one he uses when you make love.

"No..." he says, still sputtering that viscous fluid. "I have... to... say..." But he can't. He can't say any more because his lungs are seizing and all he can do now is take in sharp breaths, hyperventilating.

"Love... you," he says through gasps.

And though you don't say it often, this is the one time you can't afford to not say it, the one time you have to make sure he really knows how you feel because it will be the last time. The last time you'll ever get to tell him this and you curse yourself for never taking advantage of all the times you could have. But that's how it works, isn't it? You never know what you have till it's gone, you always took him for granted and this is your karma.

You cradle his head in your hands and lean in real close, pressing your lips against his bloodied mouth. And against your lips, as they move with the last _I love you, Takeshi _he'll ever hear, you feel him take his last breath.

You hold him for what feels like such a short little while when in all actuality, the Guardians have let you grieve with him in your arms for a few hours before Shamal and Reborn have to pry you away, kicking and thrashing like a child having a temper tantrum while Hibari and Kusakabe take him out of the room.

Shamal sedates you and as you feel your consciousness slipping away you think that time is a really sadistic bastard, especially to you. It's never given you enough, not with your mother and now, not with him. It's taken her away before her time, and it's just now claimed the life of the only man you've ever loved, too soon for your liking. It likes to play cruel tricks on you, giving you brief fragments of sheer happiness only to cut them short. It almost seems like it's taunting you and you guess for all the lives you've claimed, this is your karma too.

And in the moment, it feels like you're the one that's dying because you have no idea how you're going to live without him.

You can only hope that time will take pity on you, just this once and make it so it's not too long before you're reunited with the ones it has taken away from you.


End file.
